Outage affects 47 Newport Beach residents

Bryce Alderton

Brian Kenyon was stuck in a dark elevator for nearly an hour Sunday

with a phone that didn’t work in the Villa Balboa condominium complex he

resides in because of a 45-minute power outage caused by a downed

electrical wire.

The Newport Beach resident entered the elevator at 11:29 a.m., not

expecting to be in too long.

“I got in the elevator and went down a few feet before it stopped. The

lights flickered a little bit, then everything went pitch black,” Kenyon

said.

Kenyon said he tried calling 911 on his cell phone while in the

elevator but had trouble getting through.

Kenyon then began banging on the elevator door, eventually catching

the attention of one of his neighbors, who then called 911 and the

building manager.

“I wasn’t sure who I was talking to, but I was just glad to be talking

to someone. It’s strange being in a dark room yelling through the wall,”

Kenyon said.

Two trucks from the Newport Beach Fire Department were dispatched. One

truck went to the scene of the downed wire at 7302 W. Ocean Front, while

the other went to the condominium complex off Ticonderoga Street and

Superior Avenue.

Then at 12:18 p.m., the power came back on and took Kenyon down to the

first floor, where the Fire Department came to meet him.

‘It was an awful experience, but not terrifying,” Kenyon said. “The

only time I worried was the first few minutes when I couldn’t contact

anyone because the phone inside the elevator was broken and my cell phone

had no reception.” The outage only affected the 47 residents living at

the condominiums, located at 240 Nice Lane, Edison officials said. The

Newport Beach Fire Department said a transformer on a utility pole

popped, causing the one wire to disconnect.